Basketball Dribbling and Ball Handling Video Clips, Fundamentals, Drills, and Tips
Most coaches use dribbling and ball handling interchangeably. Though they are linked, the 2 skills are definitely separate.
Dribbling and controlling the ball is a skill that can be practiced alone and is separate from the other ball skills on the court. Ball handling, however, involves knowledge of the game and integrates dribbling, passing and decision-making.
Practicing and improving your dribbling is a simple task. There are innumerable dribbling drills that are in use today that are challenging and effective. The set of drills that have come to be known as "Maravich Drills," (after the late ball-handling wizard Pete Maravich) are widely known. They include drills such as passing the ball around your body, dribble figure 8s, spider dribbling, drop and catch.
Practicing and improving your ball handling requires imagination, as you have to put yourself in game situations.
One of our favorite series of ballhandling drills that helps develop better ballhandlers is the Maravich series! Watch it below.
9 Tips To Improve Your Dribbling & Ball Handling
Here are 9 tips from pro coach Don Kelbick.
Dribble the ball hard. The more time the ball spends in your hand, the more control you have of the ball. The harder you dribble, the quicker it gets back in your hand.
Head up at all times. Look at the rim or a spot on the wall during all practice.
Use your finger tips to control the ball, not your palm.
Use your imagination. Picture when and how you would use each of the dribbles.
Teach mentality. There is too much dribbling for no reason in our game today. I like to teach that the primary purpose for putting the ball on the floor is to get a lay-up. If you don't have an opportunity, don't put it on the floor.
Basketball is a game of length. Work on lengthening the dribble. Work to get your opportunities with 1 dribble. You don't beat defenses with your dribble. You beat people with your feet; you SEPARATE from your defense with the dribble.
Basketball is also a game of angles. Try to move in straight lines. Whenever you make an "East-West" move (something that takes you toward the sideline), re-capture a "North-South" path (direct line to the basket) as quickly as possible.
Don't do things in 2 dribbles that you can do in 1.
Practice outside your comfort zone. Experiment; go faster than you are used to, use your imagination. When working on new skills, don't be concerned with losing the ball. Just pick it up and do it again. If you practice only things that are comfortable, then you will never improve.
More Ball Handling Tips and Articles
Executing The Basketball Pick and Roll
The Importance of the Back Up Dribble and How It Reduces Turnovers Against Pressure
A Secret to Chris Paul's Success - Change of Pace
Handling Ball Screens Like Steve Nash
Chris Paul Hesitation Move & The Importance of Counter Moves [VIDEO]
Other Blog Posts About Ball Handling
Dribbling Practice
"Maravich Drills" are very good at getting players comfortable with the ball. Below are some examples.
Dribble Figure 8's - Spread legs about shoulder width. Dribble the ball through and around legs in a figure 8. Can be done multiple ways - front to back, back to front, low dribbles (as many dribbles as possible with dribble about shoe height), as few dribbles as possible (high dribble about waist high), can even be done walking. For even more of a challenge, try the drill with one hand instead of two.
Spider Dribble - Feet spread about shoulder width. Dribble the ball between your legs in the following manner - left hand, right hand in front of your legs; left hand, right hand behind your legs. Work to as fast a possible.
Drop and Catch - Hold ball between your legs with right hand in front of your body, left hand behind. Drop the ball and exchange you hand position and re-catch the ball before it hits the ground.
These are just examples. There are too many of these drills to list here. Pete Maravich devised these drills out of his imagination, his need for challenge and his drive to improve. You do not need to be bound by other people's drills; challenge yourself to come up with your own drills.
Dribbling Warm Ups
I prefer to practice skills in combinations that are relevant to multiple aspects of the game. It saves time and instills a great sense of urgency.. It
saves time and has a great sense of urgency. One of the ways I do this is to add dribbling into my stretching exercises.
Hamstring Stretch - While dribbling with your right hand, cross right leg over left. Bend at the waist, touch the floor with your left
hand and bring your dribble down to shoe top level. Hold for an 8 count. Reverse position and switch hands.
Lower Body and Achilles Stretch - Dribble waist high while standing up. Step as far forward with your right leg as you can, keeping
your back straight and your left heel on the ground. At the same time bring your dribble forward of your right foot, keeping the ball at
shoe-top height. Hold for an 8 count and then stand up. Switch legs and dribble hand.
Crossover - Same as above except, step forward with left leg. As foot goes to the floor, switch hands, right to left, keeping
dribble shoe top height. Cross back when standing up.
Through Legs - Same as above except instead of crossing over, put ball through legs at shoe top height.
Multiple Through Legs - Same as above except put ball through legs 3 times (left, right, left) on quick, successive dribbles
shoe top height.
Torso Twist - Spread legs outside of shoulder width, dribble with right hand. Keeping legs straight, bring ball across body to
left side, outside left foot and dribble at shoe top height behind left foot.
These are just samples. You can develop a dribble stretch for any part of the body.
Two Ball Dribbling Drills & Videos:
I think the most effective way to improve your dribble, however, is by using 2 balls. Any dribble or drill you can do with 1 ball, you can do with 2.
Stationary practice at first will build confidence. Stand on the baseline and try to control both balls. Then start to move. Go half court, then full court. Follow
the lines around the court or in any route you can come up with.
To see more DRILLS & VIDEOS Click Here.
The difference between dribbling and ball handling is intent. Dribbling is the skill of controlling the ball as you bounce it to the floor. Ball handling (at least 1 aspect of ball handling) is what you do with that dribble.
Whether you use it to go to the basket, make a passing angle, escape from pressure or anything else, those situations have to be imagined and practiced.
Here are some situational drills:
Full Court Lay-ups - Start on the baseline. Dribble full court with right hand in 5 dribbles and make a lay-up, come back with left hand. Then reduce the number of dribbles to 4 and then to 3.
Chair Changes - Place a chair about 21 feet from the basket. It can be on top, on the wing, or in the corner. Start about 8-10 feet beyond the chair. Dribble straight at the chair. At the chair, use a change of direction dribble (crossover, inside out, behind back, etc) to go beyond the chair and make a lay-up. Try to get to the point where you only need one dribble to get to the lay-up. Practice all the changes.
Two up - Two back - Set a chair such as in the drill above. Take 2 hard dribbles at the chair. When reaching the chair, take 2 backup dribbles. After the second dribble, push ahead into 1 dribble lay-up or pull-up jumpshot.
Dropstep Dribble - (works on footwork and ballhanding)
Chair Curl - This is another great multi use drill. It combines shooting, ball handling and speed and high intensity change in direction.
Chair Curl Phase 2 (With 2 Chairs)
Two Ball Dribbling Drills & Moves - Excellent way to improve one on one moves.
Basketball Pick and Roll Drills
Shooting drills can also be adapted to work on ball handling aspects by adding changes of direction and pivoting to create 1 and 2 dribble opportunities for either jumpers or lay-ups.
Once you have developed a feel for the ball, it's very important that you practice your ball handling in competitive, game-like situations with defenders present. In the DVD 30 Competitive Skill Development Drills, you will find 12 drills that are specific to improving your ball handling skills in game-like situations.
More Dribbling and Ball Handling Drills
Coaches, go here for more Dribbling & Ball Handling Drills
Players, go here for more Dribbling & Ball Handling Drills
Recommended Training Resources:
Youth Ball Handling & Workout App - Over 200 ball handling and footwork drills. 24 Different Levels.
SKLZ Court Vision dribble goggles will help you develop better ball control and improved awareness of the whole court. They force players to handle the ball with their head up to survey the court...(more info)
5 Things You Need To Know To Be a Great Ball Handler
By Jeff Haefner
You can be an extremely effective ball handler by knowing and practicing 5 things. Most players and coaches make
things too complicated. But dribbling effectively is simple. You don't need lots of moves. You just need EFFECTIVE moves.
Here's all you need to know to be effective at any level.
1 - You need to develop a feel for the basketball.
Developing a feel for the ball consists of drills that are stationary and slow moving. You will improve your hand-eye coordination, hand quickness, ambidexterity, throwing, catching and other important aspects of ball handling.
These drills consists of the Maravich series, one-ball dribbling, one-ball dribbling through cones, two-ball dribbling, two-ball dribbling through cones, tennis ball dribbling, and the Steve Nash passing series.
These drills are also great to put at the beginning of your warm up as a stepping stone to more intense drills.
A huge mistake that many players and coaches make is that they spend too much time on this. While it is important, especially for beginners, limit yourself to 5 to 6 minutes of each practice. The reasoning is that you can get very good at these drills, but you neglect the components below, you won't have the ability to handle game situations. If you can dribble 3 basketballs while juggling 5 tennis balls at the same time, it looks cool and it is a neat circus trick that is great for marketing, but it is a circus trick. It is not going to make you a better basketball player. The majority of your ball handling should be functional which means that they simulate game-like situations. Can you get down the court in 3 to 4 dribbles with either hand? Can you stop on a dime? Can you change speed and change directions like Chris Paul?
If you are able to dribble 3 balls and juggle 5 tennis balls at the same time, I would say that your hand-eye coordination, dexterity, and hand quickness are extremely good and you probably don't need to focus on them any more. You probably should spend more time on shooting, footwork, athleticism, and functional ball handling.
2 - You must be able to dribble the ball down the court at any speed (all the way from walking up to sprinting) with both hands with your head up.
Pretty simple but important, right? You can simply dribble up and down the court at different speeds.
3 - You must be able to change your pace.
It's good to incorporate change of pace in your dribbling drills.
Chris Paul is the
expert at changing speeds (pace). That allows him to get the defender off balance.
Practice changing the pace from walking, slow, medium, fast, and full speed. You can change the pace from slow to fast, medium to full speed, and any
other combinations you can imagine.
4 - You must be able to dribble while moving backwards.
So now instead of going forward, you need to be able to back out of traffic and so on. That's where the
back up dribble comes into play.
Simply, get in a position where you are protecting the ball and shuffle forwards and backwards up and down the court.
Next, you can practice running forward at a faster speed, come to hockey stop, and shuffle a couple of steps backwards.
Mix it up so you can handle any situation.
5 - You must have a primary dribble move and a counter dribble move.
If you perfect a go-to move that's very difficult to stop, good defenders will adjust to stop it. That's when you add your counter move to completely
keep the defender guessing.
I prefer the cross over as the primary move and the inside out as the counter move. You might use the hesitation move and the crossover.
That's it! Perfect those five things and when it comes to dribbling, you'll have the dribbling ability to handle almost any situation. Should you also
practice other things for ball handling? Sure. Now do you need apply the technical skills to competitive drills to handle game situations like transition, ball screens, handling traps, etc.? Yes. Do you need to improve your athleticism to make you a better player in every aspect of your game? Yes. But I'm telling you, that these are five extremely effective methods to give you the technical skill to handle any situation.
You can use the back up dribble all the time -- you use it when approaching a trap, when approaching defensive traffic, when getting cut off in the lane, when breaking the press, when breaking a player down one on one, etc.
You can then incorporate the cross over in lots of situations. If you advance the ball and get cut off you can back up dribble and then cross over to break down your man and blow by him. You can cross over to change directions and bring the ball to the other side of the court. You can cross over to the passing angle to your teammate. You can cross over to split a ball screen. You can cross over on the fast break to get by the defender. You can cross over to eventually set up your counter move (the inside out). So next time instead of crossing over, fake out the defender by giving the inside out move and then blow by the defender.
You still need to practice a lot, but I think this will simplify your life greatly by focusing on a few really effective dribbling techniques instead of
trying to practice all kinds of moves and techniques that don't really help. The techniques above are the the most effective dribbling moves that I know.
How To Become A Great Ball Handler
If you'd like to become a great ball handler, check out the Progressive Ball Handling & Footwork Workouts App.
It provides a step-by-step process with professionally designed videos and workouts. It has over 200 drills and 24 levels of workouts.
What do you think? Please leave your thoughts and comments below.
An original way to beat a defender in basketball
Hello, dear visitors of basketball-training.org.ua (how long have I not written this phrase…). A few days ago, while playing basketball on one of the courts in Kharkov, I ran into a player who, when beating, used one very interesting trick that I myself like to use (but which had not yet been used against me until now).
It was then that I realized how effective this method can be, especially if it is performed by a player who is not as slow as me. Yes, I'm really far from the fastest player, so most of my "feints", if you can call them that, are based on using the opponent's speed against him (and a little physics, which you can still come in handy even on the basketball court).
So, today we're going to talk about the defender's supporting leg, the leg where the weight is transferred, and which we will use for our own purposes. Let's get started.
3 elements to beat successfully
First, you must get the ball in position from which you can attack the ring. Well, or your defender must think that you can do it. Everything is trite, but nevertheless, over and over again I come across the fact that the majority are either just too lazy to spend their energy on getting rid of guardianship and they ask for the ball a couple of meters from the three-point line, from where it is very problematic to threaten the ring. Or they just don't know how to open up.
Topic article: 3 easy ways to get the ball in basketball
So, your goal is to get the ball at least on the three-point line, as much as possible already inside the arc. This move will not work if you get the ball under the basket or on the edge of the three-second zone.
The second stage is to stagger the defender 2-3 times, simulating a pass. You just do a few lunges to the side, and at this point you need to concentrate on the legs of the defender: which of them is his weight on. Which leg becomes his support during the execution of your false display for the passage. Did you see?
The third point is the passage itself. If you know which foot the defender is on, where his weight is concentrated at the time of your deceptive movements, then you should know the following: he will not be able to step with this foot. In any case, for this the defender will have to shift the weight to the other foot - and even if he is very fast, these fractions of a second will be enough for you to beat him.
Yes, this technique will not work every time. Yes, you will not beat the defender with 100% probability. But by using this trick, you can buy time and create space. Another "trick" - step as close as possible to his supporting leg: even if he reacts very quickly, he will most likely break the rules.
How to defend yourself against such a technique?
No matter how interesting and promising the above trick looks, there is a defense against it and it is quite simple.
First method: block the attacker's strong side from the passage, positioning yourself at almost a 90 degree angle to it. Either close your weak side (let the player go to your strong side, or to the side where there is a safety net). This is a budget way. You save energy, but still give the attacking player more freedom of action.
The second way is to do hellish footwork. I won't tell you too much, it's better to look at the video, as Andre Iguudala shows in the video for Nike:
See the topic: Nike Signature Moves Part 1
where is your body weight now. Of the minuses - an unprepared player after 2-3 such defenses will “sit down” very much and become slow in defense.
The third option - get as close as possible to the player, even in the process of receiving the ball. Thus, the attacker will not have much time to think: on which leg is your weight concentrated, where to stagger you, etc.
Small conclusions
The method described above is suitable for a measured pace of the game, even more so for a streetball match in which there are no quick breaks and the probability of an effective 1v1 beat is much greater.
The method described above is not a panacea, but simply one of the ways to use the laws of physics and the lack of experience of the defending player.
This method is difficult to use in its pure form if you are far from the basket (1-2 meters from the three-point line) or if the defender is very active.
Defending against such a technique is quite simple, the main thing is to understand that the opponent is going to use it (most often, he looks at your feet).
And this concludes the article, I wish you successful training, success in both attacking and defensive actions and I look forward to seeing you on the pages of this site.
not all useful materials on basketball training are published on the site. You can find additional information about training, ask a question or share your successes in our community on the social network Vkontakte: https://vk.com/uroki_basketbola
Maxim Gordienko
How to effectively beat your opponents? Passage under the support
Among the many deceitful movements and options for beating opponents in basketball, there are both very effective tricks and not the best ways. For players who cannot boast of good speed data, there is a particularly good solution. So, we will talk about the supporting leg of the defender, which can be used for your own purposes.
Get new forecasts: Vkontakte and Telegram .
3 components of a successful prank
First and perhaps most important, you must get possession of the ball in a position that allows you to attack the ring. At least the defender should think you can do it. It would seem trite, but in fact it turns out that many players frankly do not think about the need to release from custody, as a result, getting the ball a couple of meters from the three-pointer, from where it is very problematic to threaten the ring. Thus, the task is to get the ball on the line of a three-point throw, and better - inside the arc.
The second point is to loosen the defender 2-3 times, simulating a pass. Making several lunges to the side, you should pay attention to the position of the opponent's legs. Your task is to determine on which leg the opponent's weight is located. You need to understand which leg is the supporting one for him when you perform a false show on the pass.
The third stage is the passage itself. If you are sure that you know on which foot the defender's weight is concentrated, then you must understand that he will not be able to step with this foot, and if he can, he will lose some time to transfer his weight to the other foot. These few moments should be enough for you to beat.
Protection against such reception
The described way of playing looks very interesting and promising, but painfully simple defense can be used against it.
Positioned at right angles to the attacking player, it is necessary to cover the strong side. Accordingly, you can close your weak side. Thus, it will be good to save strength, but the opponent will still have a relatively large freedom of action.
A more costly and more effective way to neutralize an attacking player is active footwork. If you can quickly work with your feet, then the opponent will hardly get the opportunity to figure out which foot is the supporting one.
Even in the process of getting the ball to the opponent, you need to get as close to him as possible. In such a situation, the attacking player will simply not have time to determine which foot your weight is on.
Summing up
The method described above is far from a panacea, but only a method of using the laws of physics and the lack of experience of defenders;
The presented method is best suited for a measured pace of the game, in which there are no sharp breaks, and the probability of a successful 1v1 beat is much higher;
If the attacking player is away from the ring, then this technique is quite difficult to perform;
Defending against this method can be extremely simple - the main thing is to understand that the attacking opponent will use this method.
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If you don't have an opportunity, don't put it on the floor.
Below are some examples.
You do not need to be bound by other people's drills; challenge yourself to come up with your own drills.
Hold for an 8 count and then stand up. Switch legs and dribble hand.
Any dribble or drill you can do with 1 ball, you can do with 2.
Stationary practice at first will build confidence. Stand on the baseline and try to control both balls. Then start to move. Go half court, then full court. Follow
the lines around the court or in any route you can come up with.
24 Different Levels.
If you can dribble 3 basketballs while juggling 5 tennis balls at the same time, it looks cool and it is a neat circus trick that is great for marketing, but it is a circus trick. It is not going to make you a better basketball player. The majority of your ball handling should be functional which means that they simulate game-like situations. Can you get down the court in 3 to 4 dribbles with either hand? Can you stop on a dime? Can you change speed and change directions like Chris Paul?
The techniques above are the the most effective dribbling moves that I know.
Yes, I'm really far from the fastest player, so most of my "feints", if you can call them that, are based on using the opponent's speed against him (and a little physics, which you can still come in handy even on the basketball court). 
This move will not work if you get the ball under the basket or on the edge of the three-second zone. 
Another "trick" - step as close as possible to his supporting leg: even if he reacts very quickly, he will most likely break the rules. 
Of the minuses - an unprepared player after 2-3 such defenses will “sit down” very much and become slow in defense. 
At least the defender should think you can do it. It would seem trite, but in fact it turns out that many players frankly do not think about the need to release from custody, as a result, getting the ball a couple of meters from the three-pointer, from where it is very problematic to threaten the ring. Thus, the task is to get the ball on the line of a three-point throw, and better - inside the arc. 
These few moments should be enough for you to beat. 
